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Opening Ceremonies Bingo: Now With More Ski Jumping!

Four years later, this low tech illusion from Torino is still one of my favorite Olympic opening ceremonies segments ever:

After this last week, a good portion of North America is going to need some snowed-in activities this weekend. So in honor of the Vancouver Games’ impending opening on Friday, I give you an updated version of Olympic Opening Ceremonies Bingo!

The rules remain the same as last time. I ended up playing the Beijing version over the phone with my parents, and we learned a few important things: it’s way more fun to play for the full “blackout” card, as opposed to just a one-line bingo, and it is also important to establish before hand whether commercials (aside from those specifically mentioned on the card) can be counted if they air during the course of the ceremony. Otherwise, you end up having an eligibility argument in the middle of the Parade of Nations, miss Uzbekistan’s entrance, and lose to your mother. Who gloats.

I’ve made up 4 cards, and included a blank template if you feel inclined to make your own. The pdf is here. Our Canadian readers will have to replace some of the NBC/Costas oriented squares with CBC related items — or you can just feel thankful your Olympic coverage will probably be ten times better than ours.

The bingo cards are great. However they need one correction for fairness. No country has more than around 220 athletes max (Can & US). I’d say go for 150 (6-7 countries) or 175 (3-4 countries). Only Can and US have more than 200. The cards with 500 just can’t win it all.